Empa Colloquia, Seminars & Events

Prof. Gottfried Schatz from the University of Basel talks about what science has given him, what he considers to be important, and what he would do differently if he could start his successful research career all over again. Most of Europe’s universities still have a long way to go in adopting attractive and yet selective career structures for young scientists.

The ice loss in Greenland shows acceleration during the last decade. WSL director Konrad Steffen explains how scientists gained new insight using ground penetrating radar and a video system during the melt peak in August 2007-2010. Water penetrates to great depth through moulins and cracks, lubricating the bottom of the ice sheet.

The energetics of nanomaterials are typically dominated by (excess) surface and/or interface energy contributions. In his talk, Dr. Lars Jeurgens from Empa, addresses recent advances in the thermodynamic description of reactions and phase transformations in nanomaterials.

3D-micropatterning of surfaces signifies a recent paradigm change for control of surface functionalities: the exploitation of cleverly designed surface protrusions at the micron scale. In his talk Prof. Eduard Arzt from the Leibniz Institute for New Materials / Saarland University, Saarbrücken, summarizes recent developments in producing bio-inspired micropatterned polymer surfaces.

Energy efficiency is a key element of many energy and environmental policies. Despite autonomous and forced improvements in energy efficiency, however, in most countries overall energy consumption has not decreased. Reinhard Madlener from RWTH Aachen explains how «rebound effects» emerge and influence further development.

The rational design of new functional materials is the dream of every materials scientist. Prof. Claudia Felser explains in her talk, why Heusler compounds are an important class of materials with potential for applications in electronic devices and green energy.

Liquid-phase routes to inorganic functional materials in organic solvents are a well-established and flexible alternative to aqueous methods. In his talk, Prof. Markus Niederberger from ETH Zurich will give an overview of nonaqueous synthesis routes to various inorganic materials such as metal oxides, metal sulfides and metal phosphates.

Interest in graphene appears endless at the moment, with most interest related to the «simple» Dirac particle like electronic structure. On the surface this simplicity would appear to make investigations into the electronic structure less than exciting. Andrew Walter explains how on the contrary the simple nature of the underlying electronic structure allows detailed analysis of the quasi-particle, hybridization and substrate interaction features observed in photoemission spectroscopy.

The global carbon cycle has become an important research topic in Earth System science. In order to understand and predict and potentially manage its behavior in response to human influences and climate change, a global scale observing system for carbon is needed. Prof. Martin Heimann talks about the scientific challenge of bringing the different data streams together in a consistent way.

Modern computational methods are proving to be invaluable in the first-principles design of new materials with specific targeted functionalities. Prof Nicola Spaldin illustrates their utility with two examples from the field of multiferroics: First, the design of new materials for electric-field control of magnetism, and second, testing extensions to the standard model by searching for the electric dipole moment of the electron.